CIVIL SOCIETY AND POLITICS IN CROATIA
CIVIL SOCIETY AND POLITICS IN CROATIA

Author(s): Lino Veljak
Subject(s): Politics / Political Sciences, Politics, Civil Society, Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), Post-Communist Transformation
Published by: CEDET Centar za demokratsku tranziciju
Keywords: civil and political society; reduced civil society; transition; democratic culture; liberal-democratic order; stable democracy
Summary/Abstract: The paper discusses the role of civil society in the process, which led to the change of government at the parliamentary elections held on January 3, 2000. After an operative definition of the reduced civil society and a presentation of the genesis of the civil society and of the multiparty system in Croatia, the author reconstructs the shaping of the civil society in the period marked by the authoritarian rule of the HDZ. Special attention has been dedicated to independent media and the NGOs adhering to a system of values compatible with the liberal-democratic order. The role of civil society in building a democratic culture appropriate to such an order cannot be defined precisely, just as it is difficult to define the degree of direct and indirect influence of civil society on the results of the aforementioned elections. Arguments corroborating the relevance of this influence have been given, as well as arguments questioning the attempt to ascribe excessive or decisive importance to such influence. The relation between civil and political society is also problematized, and their ambivalent interaction is pointed out.

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